Category: Weight Loss

So earlier this month we talked about having a simple default system or gameplan to fall back on when things get overly busy. Did you have a chance to formulate a plan?

Here in Mindset Matters we talk a lot about watching our thoughts. This is because everything we do, every choice we make, all of our behaviors happen downstream of what we’re thinking.

When we think thoughts like:

It’s been such a long day, I’m exhausted and I’m hungry. I don’t have any groceries in the house. I’m too tired to cook.

It’s really hard to change the direction and outcome of these thoughts when we don’t have a few tricks up our sleeve.

While the best success will be achieved by creating solutions that are custom-made for you and your likes and dislikes, I can give you a few suggestions or examples.

If we give it a few minutes thought, we can decide ahead on a few of the basics:

Am I attempting to curb my hunger at my weakest spot in the day? How could I stay more hydrated during the day? What is a slightly healthier choice at each of my favorite restaurants that I can lean on when my plans change?

Having a healthy go-to emergency snack food I keep in my purse has saved me over and over. So has keeping extra water in my car, and a chosen-in-advance healthier option or strategy for restaurants that are convenient to my daily schedule. I don’t have to choose these every single time, but I have worked up to most of the time.

If we think we can wait until we are overly tired, overly hungry or underprepared, we know this will be an uphill battle in the moment, and it’s much harder to bring that higher level thinking back online.  

Just a handful of simple decisions made ahead of time can go a very long way. We must begin with the basics.

Let’s decide today and be ready.

This past month has been one of those months!

You know the ones, full of unexpected twists and turns, red tape, illnesses, and so on. Between nursing an injury, dealing with thousands in fraudulent credit card use, a mix up at the DMV that had me unable to drive my car for two weeks, and more (all fixable problems btw and thankful for that), nothing felt like it was going right.

But do you know what did go right? My plan for healthier eating and exercise. This was because I have a reliable system that allows me to stay on track no matter how sideways things get.

Do you have a reliable system in place? Are you able to stick to a plan even when you feel like giving up because life has used up your extra energy? The extra energy that you would need to have to food prep, count, or track the food you eat?  Nothing against those effective strategies, but do they fit into your busy life right now?

Having a default plan and well thought out strategies to combat cravings or temptations to overeat is critical to maintaining the consistency you need to reach your goal. I’m not talking about perfection either.  But I am talking about a reliable, convenient, simplified methodology for personal accountability.

We basically have two choices, to go into your day and wing it, or to have a game plan and to be prepared to pivot if need be.

If you need help crafting a plan that fits into your busy lifestyle, and you are ready to make your health and wellness a priority, reach out to learn about my methodology.

If you decide to go it alone, you can still do this. I encourage you take the time to develop a default system to fall back on for when the unexpected hits. This simple approach will serve you over and over again. We know that we don’t make the best decisions in the moment when we’re hungry, so let’s be honest with ourselves and take some simple steps to get ahead of the ball so we can get results.

Wishing you health and happiness!

For a free call click here: https://coachingwithkaren.as.me

What’s the secret to breaking the cycle of giving in to cravings for junk food?

It’s simply a skill that you have to learn.

It isn’t that you weren’t born with self-discipline, or you just don’t have it in you to get the weight off and keep it off, it’s just that you haven’t been taught how.

You have to learn the skill of how to say no to cravings and stick to your plan even when temptations come knocking.

You have to get laser focused on the problem, where your weak moments are and why.

You have to pay attention to the thoughts you are thinking in that moment, the ones that tell you there isn’t enough time to pick something healthier, or that you’ve had a hard day and you deserve it, or that this is somehow a unique situation and we will start over tomorrow.

Those thoughts are all lies. There is always something you can do to make a better choice than you have in the past, always.

Will we slip up? Of course, we’re human, and some days are hard.

When we do slip up, it’s not what we ate that’s the problem, it’s what we do and say to ourselves afterwards that matters.

Gaining awareness of those thoughts that lead us astray, and the ones that hold us back after we slip, is the best use of your time in the beginning, not being so focused on food or trying to exercise your way out of bad eating habits.

When you can get control of what’s going on in your mind with regard to junk food, you will be able to unlock the hold that a craving has on you, and then you can break the cycle for good.

p.s  If you are ready to start turning your personal goal into a reality, HIT REPLY to find out how I can help you get there faster. I have 3 SPOTS AVAILABLE for my next round of coaching. Get ahead of the holiday season with this methodology that will help you to enjoy the foods of the season without overindulging! You won’t be sorry you did!

Whenever I’m having a bad day, and the new healthy habit that I’m working on begins to feel out of reach or unattainable, one of my helpful go to thoughts is, “Just win the inning.”

If you are a baseball mom, this might sound familiar to you. If it doesn’t, let me explain.

Instead of focusing on winning the game, a better strategy is to focus on winning the inning.

By viewing the game in the shorter timeframe, it brings a greater sense of focus to what we can do right now to achieve success. Your next move is of the utmost importance.

Are you keenly aware of your opponent’s positions on the field? Are you anticipating the possible outcomes of the next at bat and are ready to act accordingly?

This is a lot like the various challenges that we face each day that threaten our desire to eat right or exercise.

We may not have the whole week figured out, but we can focus on today and be aware of potential downfalls and be ready to pivot.

If we keep our minds focused on today and our present situation, we can win today, which is a lot like winning the inning.

With enough successful innings, before you know it, you’ve won the game.

How is your inning going, and what is your next move?

Karen

Start making real progress toward your goal by letting me know what you could use help with!

You meet yourself where you are.

You eat the foods that you like.

You use the psychology of the brain to your advantage, and you learn how to outsmart unhealthy patterns.

You get super clear on your trouble spots.

You learn strategies to combat your obstacles, and you get help when you need it.

It’s doable.

It’s simple.

It’s a proven methodology.

What is this program not?

This program is not restrictive, there’s no deprivation or foods that are off-limits.

It’s not complicated or time consuming.

There are no products, shakes, or supplements to purchase.

Just the self-discipline you need to stick to your goal.

Stop fighting your cravings and learn the skill of conquering them instead.

They should have taught us this in school.

Simple. Straightforward. Solutions.

Schedule a call here if you would like to learn more: https://coachingwithkaren.as.me

If counting calories or macros works for you, then I am all for it, keep doing it!

But, if you haven’t found long-term success by doing so, and are feeling stuck or discouraged with losing weight, I would offer you this.

What if we don’t need to count calories or macros?

What if we don’t need to enter everything we’re eating into an app, or scrutinize how many carbs are in the foods we eat?

What if we could just eat when we’re truly hungry and stop when we’re full?

What if we could stop eating for emotional reasons or by the clock, and simply listen to our bodies and allow them to regulate our needs as they have for thousands of years, before processed foods.

Sounds too easy? Let me ask you this, do you check in with yourself before reaching for a snack or before filling up your plate?

Do you ever pause to ask yourself if your desire for a snack is out of true physical hunger, or is it for emotional reasons? Most of us don’t. Most of us fall into a pattern that we feel like we don’t have much control over changing, or that’s too hard to change. But what if it’s really not?

Learning how to pull back the curtain on our eating habits is really important if you’re not getting the results you are wanting with regard to your health. Taking a look at the psychology related your habits and using it to your advantage to get leverage over cravings is enormously powerful.

And when you can combine proven strategies along with personalized coaching to ensure you’re taking action, that becomes the key to long term success.

And then, deciding whether to count or not to count becomes unnecessary.

Schedule a call here if you would like to learn more: https://coachingwithkaren.as.me

What? Why would I want to keep any junk food around when I’m trying to lose weight?

Why would I want to tempt myself with sugary treats?

Because until we learn the SKILL of being around sweets and NOT indulging in them, we can’t fully be in control around them.

Some of the wisest words I once heard were “We will never be able to control our anger apart from situations that provoke it.” It’s the same with cravings!

If you remove every possible temptation from your kitchen, what happens when we are around them at restaurants, parties, or events? We can’t always control our environment, someone will always be offering us sweets and other desserts. It’s helpful to allow at least some temptations to stay in order to practice managing the desire for them.

What I want to equip you with is a methodology for learning to PROCESS cravings. To learn to sit with them, how to not give in to them, how to feel all the feels and in the process, strengthen our self-discipline.

Worried  that self-discipline is something you weren’t born with?

Not true. It’s just a skill that no one ever taught you.

One that anyone can learn as long as they’re committed to learning it.

I invite you to learn this methodology risk free. 

Schedule a call here if you would like to learn more: https://coachingwithkaren.as.me

If you liked the best-selling book Atomic Habits, by James Clear, you are going to love the approach I use for weight loss. There are so many similarities.

For example, his quote “If you want better results, then forget about setting goals. Focus on your system instead.”

I know it sounds counterintuitive. Forget your goal? But it’s true. So often we fixate on the goal, typically a number on the scale that we’ve decided is our goal weight.

We spend a lot of time thinking about that number, how happy we were when the scale once read X pounds. Or, how happy we will be in the future.

We are so attached to reaching that number that we start considering all the possible ways we can get there, asap! A new diet you heard about that worked for someone else, wondering just how few calories could you get by on, or you decide to only eat salads until you reach the goal.

Drastic temporary measures to reach the goal fast, without much consideration on how we plan on staying there.

James Clear also points out, “The purpose of setting goals is to win the game. The purpose of building systems is to continue playing the game. It’s not about any single accomplishment. It’s about the cycle of endless refinement and continuous improvement.”

If we want a permanent solution to weight loss, we should be building the systems we need to not only get to the goal, but stay there.

Whether you use my program or your own, shoot for improvements that are simple, clear, and 100% doable. Attainable habits that can become part of your system.

If you are done with the quick-fix mentality of diets, I invite you to come join me and try my life-long methodology risk free.

Contact me here at www.coachingwithkaren.com to reach out and learn more or schedule a free Zoom call, and let’s get started on a system customized for you.

Why is mindset so important when it comes to weight loss?

Because the only reason we don’t reach any goal we’ve set out for ourselves is because of the voice in our heads that puts up obstacles.

The voice that says I can’t do it because…I don’t have time for…I’m just too busy…I have too much in my plate right now, but when things settle down…It’s really hard to go without x (insert food or habit that you’d like to change)…I have tried before and it didn’t work.

If we are feeling determined, we often try to push against that voice, or stifle it. We may gain some temporary traction with willpower.

But if the underlying belief that ‘it’s so hard’ or ‘this is going to be difficult’ is still there, it eventually sneaks back in during our weak moments, can make us feel defeated, and can sabotage our efforts to keep making progress and stay on track.

What’s valuable is to recognize this pattern, to know that these thoughts may show up, and be on the lookout for them.

Be onto yourself with the excuses, know that our brains prefer the easy and familiar, and be prepared to have strategies in place to uphold the new habit we want to intentionally choose instead.

Giving this some thought ahead of time is key to your success and is what we work on to make sure you’re prepared when those weak moments arrive, and they always do.

Want to work on mindset? It’s the missing piece to reaching your goal if you haven’t.